From the Couch: January
Cooper’s resolution is to stop eating socks!
I don't know about you, but I always love the new year. I've always loved the process of getting a new planner and taking some time to reflect and set new goals/intentions. I will admit, that I can easily go overboard with all the planning on all the things I want to do/goals I want to set. So over the years I have worked to tone it down, to try to focus on one thing, creating a SMART goal, sometimes picking a word, setting different mini goals each month, etcetera, etcetera, etcetera.
I will admit, that usually come March I've forgotten about my goals and I'm back to my "norm." Lately I've been reading and researching a little more about habits and goals and I've found some common threads around how we create real, lasting change (and why change is so hard 😬).
One of the main components of this is to start to identify to the change component- that the new behavior becomes a part of who you are. For example- if your goals it to become more physically fit, the idea is to start to become the athlete your envision, to have fitness be a part of who you are.
For me, physical fitness has always been a goal of mine and it’s always felt out of reach. I played soccer through high school and that had been part of my identity. Once I stopped playing, my identity as an athlete went away with it. Over the years I’ve gone through spurts of exercise and getting into a routine, but work, having kids, and some minor injuries/illnesses here and there always derailed me for a lot longer time than the actual times of being in a routine. This year, I’m trying to approach it in a little different way- exploring the sides of me that are resistant to exercise and working to shift my mindset and identity around physical exercise.
30 Day Yoga Challenge with Adriene and her dog Benji
This month, I’m starting my fitness journey doing the 30 Day Yoga Challenge put on by Yoga with Adriene. I did this last year but stopped mid-way due to a family bout of the stomach flu and then hurting my back 😫. This year I’m taking a different approach. As Adriene likes to emphasize, the hardest work is the showing up part, so this year I’m going to show up and then if I have to limit how I engage, that’s okay.
Tell me, do you have any goals for yourself over this next year? Feel free to share in the comments.
What I'm Reading
For Fun
Beach Read by Emily Henry. This is actually the third book of hers that I read (after Book Lovers, then People We Meet on Vacation). All three of these books are fun reads, they remind me of the Romantic Comedy movies of the past (whatever happened to those??). Last year for Mother’s Day I requested a big breakfast with my family and then some alone time to read a book. It had been awhile since I had time to read for fun and taking that time to read catapulting me to continue to read. I then set a goal to read 15 "fun" books (so not work related, which are still fun but in a different way 😝) before the year ended. I realized the last week of December that I had read 14, so I got to reading and finished this one with a few days to spare*. This year I set my goal to 24. Let me know if you have any recommendations- I love a good mystery and books that fall into this "beach read" category. Also- feel free to follow me on Good Reads (goodreads.com/mmparr) you just have to promise to not make fun of my book choices. 😚
*upon looking over my Good Reads account, I realized a couple books weren’t accounted for, so I actually read 18 books last year so decided to up my goal to 30 books for this year!
For Work
Immunity to Change- I started this last month but put it aside during the holidays and now I’m back into it. It’s a pretty eye-opening way to look at change and how we all have these sort of “built-in” systems that keep us from actually making changes.
Atomic Habits by James Clear- I've read this before and I'm revisiting it at the beginning of the year. This is a great book all about change and building habits. He goes over the research and background on why change is so hard and how to set yourself up for success to create better habits. He talks a lot about the need to "become" what you want to change. His quote- "the process of habits is the process of becoming yourself" - really hits this home. I highly recommend this book and it's one that you can return to time and time again.
What I'm Watching
We watched a bunch of Christmas movies last month, but have now find myself in a bit of a rut with what to watch and with a lot of my favorite shows on hiatus or between season.
We did just start a short-series on Netflix called “Treason.” Pretty interesting so far- it’s about the British’s version of the CIA where the leader gets poisoned, then the deputy gets put in charge and he finds himself in quite the predicament. It was a little confusing at first, not knowing the British intelligence system, but a couple episodes in and I feel that I’m understanding it. It’s only 5 episodes, so I’ll be needed my next show after this. Let me know of any recommendations.
Another thing I’m enjoying is the Big Bear Bald Eagle Live Cam. It streams the nest of Jackie & Shadow, a bald eagle couple. They tend to lay 1-2 eggs in January each year. Last year, one egg hatched into an eaglet. It was quite the sight to watch them build the nest, take turns lying on the egg, and then feeding their baby.
What I'm Listening To:
I’ve been enjoying the podcast by Ella Mills for quite some time. Initially it was called “Deliciously Ella” and then they rebranded it for Season 8 as Wellness Unpacked. On Episode 14 she interviews Dr. Will Bulsiewicz, who wrote the book Fiber Fueled. This is a great book on health and particularly your gut health and how it’s tied to your overall health including your mental health. I definitely recommend to explore all the different episodes on her podcast and also check out Dr. Will’s book, Fiber Fueled if you find nutrition and gut health interesting.
What I'm Cooking:
My husband and I love cooking (although cooking for our kids is a totally different thing 😬). I got my husband a new cookbook called The Wicked Healthy Cookbook by Chad & Derek Sarno for Christmas that I'm excited for us to dig into (and mostly excited for him to cook me some delicious meals 😆).
I'm also excited to cook from The Vegan Week by Gena Hamshaw. Her other cookbook, Power Plates is one of the my all-time favorites. This new one is around meal planning and prepping ahead of time. I'm excited to try this out in different ways to see how I can better set myself up for success when it comes to cooking.
Also, just a little note- you may have guessed from these cookbooks, I am vegetarian and have been since 2007. It actually started out as a New Year's resolution to go meat-free for 30 days and it stuck. While there was a period of time that I ate seafood, I never went back to eat meat, not even for a one-time thing. What made this stick for me is that it became a part of me and my identity. I was just starting to get into cooking and this really propelled me to that next level. I had to learn about becoming vegetarian, what nutrition I needed to account for, and I had to become a lot more creative in how I imagined my meals. This was before the time of all the new vegan meats and expanded vegetarian/vegan options, so it was definitely a challenge. It was a lot harder in the beginning to say "no" to food that contained meat, but I was committed to it and the longer I abstained from meat, the better I felt. It eventually became a part of who I was, therefore there was no "giving in" or quitting cause it was hard, it just became my status quo.
This really ties back to the concept in Atomic Habits of the habit becoming a part of your identity. I'm definitely thinking on this and trying to use this into my own current goals. Shifting out of a mindset of "something I have to do" to "this is part of who I am."
Till next time,
Melissa, the Yogi 😉
*links to products are affliate links, meaning I get a small percentage of the sales total at no extra cost to you.
